Boi de prata: política e cultura na estreia do sertão do seridó no cinema terceiro-mundista brasileiro (1970-1980)

Abstract

This study analyzes the many aspects of the first cinematographic representation of the Seridó and its relation to the political culture of brazilian cinema. From the end of 1978 to the beginning of 1979, the feature film Boi de Prata was filmed in Caicó - Rio Grande do Norte, and was one of the first movies produced through the decentralization policy of the newly created state movie company Embrafilme. By producing the film both about and in the Seridó, where he was born, the director Carlos Augusto Ribeiro Jr. created an imagetic narrative about the Seridó’s Sertão and Brazil as Third World territories, providing an alternative to the dispute between the conservative and the progressive-marxist notions of the decentralised spatial production. We’ll show that the director acted according to the Brazilian cinema tradition, which is to contribute to the regional and national identity, by using topics of the popular culture such as religion, legends, music, dance and oral literature.